


necklace

by lloydshoulddyehishair



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: ? - Freeform, Broken Promises, Childhood Friends, Childhood Promises, F/M, Friends to Enemies to Lovers, Post-Episode: s12e10 The Timeless Children, Protecc, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Thoschei, friendship necklace, soft hours: on, the master is soft for thirteen because shes just baby, thirteen is a mess, thirteen needs a hug and the masters there to give her one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-19
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:21:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23220874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lloydshoulddyehishair/pseuds/lloydshoulddyehishair
Summary: She thought she had left this part of her past behind her. Turns out she was wrong.
Relationships: The Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who), Thirteenth Doctor/The Master (Dhawan)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 92





	necklace

Every time she defeated the Master it didn't feel like she won at all.

She felt like she lost, because with each time they stood against each other they grew further and further away.

  
  
They were all they had left.

The only ones to understand the pain of the other.

Why couldn't they just get along?

The Doctor kicked against the TARDIS' console in anger. "I hate this.", she muttered. "I hate all of this."

The TARDIS was silent. Her fam had gone home to get some peace after this extremely tiring adventure. For then it was over but for her it had really just begun. She had to find out who she truly was, where she came from. Did she have family in another Universe?

She hoped she was having a nightmare, that she was just about to wake up to a world where everything was how she knew it to be for thousands of years.

But she was pretty sure all of this was real.

  
  
She ran through the TARDIS, into her bedroom eagerly looking for something.

"Where is it? Where, where, where?!", she threw the clothes out of her closet until her eyes fell on a little brown box that could only be opened with a key. Luckily the Doctor had the key under her pillow.

She grabbed it and went into the bathroom, slowly sitting down on the toilet seat.

"Deep breaths.", she whispered to herself, voice staring to shake.

It was almost as if time stood still. Her opening the box felt like eternity. Eternity until she saw the necklace now visible in the little chest and all of a sudden everything happened way too fast.

Tears began to stream down her cheeks as she took the necklace in her hand and eyed it.  
  
To a stranger it really mustn't have been something special. It was a simple gold necklace with the letter "K" on it. But to the Doctor it meant so much. So, so much. More than words would ever be able to describe.

Because this necklace was given to her on their graduation day from the Academy. Koschei, now better known as the Master, gave it to her and said that as long as she kept it nothing would ever break them apart.

A bitter laugh escaped the blondes throat as tears fell onto the necklace.

She really couldn't understand where they went wrong, where they started to go separate ways and most importantly where they started to despise each other.

  
She put the golden accessoire back into the box - because that was all that it was, just a silly little accessoire nothing more, nothing less - making her way over to the cabinet.

"I promised him.", she opened the cabinets door. "I promised him I'd stop.", her voice barely audible, just a whisper.

She took out a silver blade and put her sleeve down.

"But he also promised that we wouldn't break apart so what are promises even worth.", she pulled the blade down her flesh with a whimper. Blood began to pour down her arm but that didn't stop her from doing it again and again and again and a-

"Theta!" and she stopped, eyes widening in disbelief and making their way to the door.

The man standing in the door frame, dark brown hair and hazel eyes widened in shock and concern, soft lips surrounded by the dark but well-kept beard. Oh how she loved the beard, but that was something she was most definitely not going to tell him.

The all too familiar face rushed to her side without hesitation, grabbing the nearest towel and putting it over her self-inflicted cuts.

"Why?", his voice was steady and calm making her relax. This new voice of his was soothing to her in a way she had never felt before – yet another thing she would never admit to him.

"I- I-", her voice was weak. She didn't feel like talking, not all.

"You promised.", he said but there was no anger or disappointment in his voice, just concern.

Hearing someone was concerned about her was nice. It was something she barely got to experience nowadays.

"So did you.", she managed to get out but not without sobbing. She hated herself for this – for how weak she was.

"You- you said we wouldn't... that we wouldn't ever b-break apart but... look at us. We.. we are enemies, Koschei.", the tears streaming down her face began to burn her eyes, her vision got blurry but she didn't mind. At least she didn't have to look at his face any more that was a constant reminder of the friend she lost.

"I don't want to fight you.", just as she spoke those words the Master put his arms around his friend, pulling her into a hug and noticed the tears starting to drain his shirt. He honestly didn't mind though. This was his Doctor, his Theta, his best friend. And she apparently thought that he hated her.

"Shh... shh... it's okay, it's all good. I'm here, aren't I?", his hands brushed her hair as a way to calm her - it worked, just like in the old days when they were just silly little children running through orange fields.

After all she was still the same.

"But for how long until we go on to try and kill each other?! For how long will this last?!". The Masters hearts broke at these words.

"Theta.", he took her face into his hands as the Doctor closed her eyes. "My Theta, please look at me.", she slowly opened them, ocean eyes meeting warm hazel ones.

"Don't ever think that I don't care about you. I do not want you dead."  
  
"Doesn't seem like it.", she sniffed standing up, quickly regretting that choice though since she immediately lost balance and would have fallen right on the cold bathroom floor if the Master hadn't caught her.

He sighed.

"I'll bring you to your room."

"No. How did you even get in here in the first place? You cant just walk into my TARDIS-", the Doctor began to ramble before getting (rudely) interrupted by the other Timelord.

"It let me in, love.", the look on her face was one the Master didn't see quite often on her. Confusion. He enjoyed it if he were to be honest.

"Why would it do that?"

"Because you needed or need me and you and your TARDIS knows that."

"Listen, i don't even know how you knew that you 'had to' come here bu-", and again she was being interrupted.

"The necklace."

"What do you mean the necklace?"

Silently the Master led the Doctor to her bedroom, helping her to sit down, just in case she got dizzy again. "Answer me.....please.", he brown haired man kneeled in front her as he took her hands in his.

"That necklace isn't just a normal necklace. When you're in physical contact with it it sends a signal to it's partner necklace, in this case mine, and tells me how you are feeling. That's why I knew."

"Does that mean... you are wearing the necklace...?"

"Always.", and there they were again. The tears. 'Doctor you are such a crappy cry baby' she thought.

After all these years where she took the moral high ground with him, preached to him about friendship and how he betrayed her trust. After all those years she found out that actually _she_ was the bad guy in this whole failed relationship.

"I am such a bad friend... You've been wearing the necklace the whole time and I just... kept it in a box, stored away in the depths of my god damn closet and now you probably hate me."

“Oh shut up.”, the Master rolled his eyes and before the Doctor even had a chance at degrading herself even more he cupped her face in his hands and placed a soft kiss on her lips, just for a mere second. It was innocent, just like back then when it was them against the Universe.

Her eyes were wide, just staring at him, looking for what he'd do next, surprised by how careful he was acting around her like she was fragile and could break any second (she probably was in all honesty).

How could this be the same man who had just tried to destroy her, her friends and the whole Universe?

He sat down next to her and was she hallucinating or was he shaking?

“Doctor, listen...”

“What I did to Gallifrey... What I did to _them_...”, he couldn't bare to look at her already knowing it would break him, just like how he broke her and he hated himself for it.

“I didn't do it because of anything I told you , well technically yes but also no.”

The Doctor couldn't help but notice how the way his hands trembled more and more with every second and laid her hands on his looking up at his face, but he still couldn't look at her, not after everything he did.

“I did it because of what they did to you. Because of how they used you. How they treated you.”, she held in a breath. “I didn't want to tell you this at first because I didn't want you to carry even more death in your heart but you need to know this in order to understand...”

He finally looked up right into her eyes. The Doctor could swear she could hear his hearts starting to beat faster.

“That I don't hate you. In fact... I do quite the opposite.”, the Doctor let out the breath she held for too long, feeling her body run cold.

“Say it.”, she squeezed his hands slightly. “Please.”

She knew words wouldn't make her feel better, they probably never would but maybe they would give her hope. Hope that they could still work out and be alright _together_.

“I love you.”

The tears fell again.


End file.
